Classrooms Update

Thank you third grade parents for all your help with donations and volunteering for Colonial Day.  Colonial Day is so much fun for third graders and is a great way for the kids to culminate the unit in social studies.  All your help and support is greatly appreciated!

Wenham Museum

Third graders have been very busy in science and have recently wrapped up scope 3.  We compared life cycles of plants and mealworms and did some investigating of other life cycles.  Currently, in scope 4 we are studying social and group behavior.  We are thinking about how can living in a group help animal’s survival.  The kids are enjoying all the engaging learning experiences and cooperative group work that goes along with each scope..

We just finished unit 3 in math which focused on the relationship between multiplication and division.  We also learned about commutative property of multiplication, associative property, and distributive property of multiplication.  Unit 4 focuses on place value, rounding to the nearest 10 and 100, and estimating sums and differences.  This will help when we begin adding and subtracting with regrouping.  Continue to study math facts in all four operations at home!

In writing, our lessons have focused on carefully going through the writing process and learning how to plan a piece of writing using a graphic organizer.  Also, students are discussing and learning about the difference between editing and revising.   Third graders have just been introduced to an editing checklist that will help guide them when looking for capital letters, punctuation, and spelling. We will also practice skills for revising written work.  

During our readers workshop block we have begun a genre study of narrative nonfiction texts.  Each day we have been reading a mentor text and students have been recording what elements and characteristics of this genre they notice.  Also, the kids can read this genre on their own in class.  To end our genre study we will ask the kids to write their own narrative nonfiction book using the key elements we have identified together as a class.

First Grade Buddies

Third graders enjoyed meeting their first grade buddies and spending time with them.  Third graders are the older buddies this year and hope to be good role models for their buddy in first grade!

Objects and Motion

Third graders used the engineering design process to design, create and test out a pop fly prototype in science.  They used their knowledge of force and motion to test if their pop fly machine could launch a marshmallow one meter in height and distance.

September

We enjoyed meeting families at the Ice Breaker and it was wonderful to see all third graders do a great job of showing their families their classroom.

September is moving quickly and we are still working on classroom routines and learning about one another.  We will continue to develop our classroom community with weekly class meetings that focus on kindness and leadership.  

Both third grade classes have started their first unit in science, which is Objects in Motion.  Our first investigation had six stations.  Students had the opportunity to explore and test balance and motion.  They recorded their data and made conclusions about force.  We will continue to investigate force and motion in the upcoming week.

At this time students are building their stamina in reading and writing.  In reading, third graders are focusing on thinking while reading and then sharing their thinking about their books with one another.  We will continue with book making in third grade and focus on expanding on our topic, writing specific information, and organization.

Unit one in math covers fact families, patterns on a hundred chart and number line, skip counting, and review of addition and subtraction facts.  These are prerequisite skills that are needed before we begin multiplication and division.  Please make sure that your child is practicing their addition and subtraction facts ten minutes each night. 

Bake Sale For Hurricane Harvey

Please join the Cutler School Community as we work to support the victims of Hurricane Harvey while teaching our children the importance of community service to others in greater need.  On Saturday, September 16th from 9:00 am - 12:00 pm, we will hold our community bake sale.  Our fifth graders will be working the sale.  We are hoping that our Cutler families will help out by baking and buying!  Baked goods should be labeled and individually packaged for easy sale.  Please indicate if your item includes nut products or is gluten free etc.  Baked goods ideally should be dropped off at the bake sale on Saturday morning however if need be, they can be dropped off in the Teacher's Room Friday by 12:00 noon.

Welcome Back!

Welcome Back!

Welcome to our third grade blog! We are excited for another great year of third grade and are enjoying building our classroom communities.  Much of our time in the next couple of weeks will be spent learning about one another and establishing classroom routines.  So far, we have had a great start to the school year and look forward to seeing families at the Ice Breaker on September 18^th from 5-7pm.